Surgical retractors are known in the prior art and have typically been used to secure a patient's mouth in an open position during a variety of surgical or other medical procedures. Several surgical retractors have found widespread use in the prior art.
The Crowe Davis (or Boyle Davis) surgical retractor (or gag) is a surgical retractor that is primarily used for tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy—very common surgical procedures performed worldwide. A modification to this retractor is the Dingman retractor, which provides surgeons with the additional capability to laterally retract a patient's cheeks for better access to deeper tissues in the mouth and throat. The Dingman surgical retractor, however, is not adapted to allow access deeper into the throat by a surgeon or by a surgical robot.
Recently, the University of Pennsylvania described using the Da Vinci surgical Robot (Intuitive Surgical, Sunnyvale Calif.) to perform surgical procedures within the upper aero-digestive tract called transoral robotic surgery (TORS). The FDA has recently approved of this robotic surgical technique to remove benign and malignant neoplasms from the throat. The University of Pennsylvania group initially described using the standard Crowe Davis gag for surgical procedures involving the tonsils, and later utilized and modified another retractor (FK Retractor, Olympus/Gyrus Germany) to allow access for the robotic arms to other areas in the throat. However, the FK Retractor is expensive, complicated to adjust and use, and has limited adjustability.
Existing surgical retractors are expensive, cumbersome to use, and do not provide the needed adjustability. Further, inserting and removing existing surgical retractors is a complicated procedure which may result in additional trauma to the patient as well as prolonged surgical time. Finally, existing surgical retractors are difficult and slow to remove from the patient's mouth in case of an emergency.
To that end, a need exists for an improved surgical retractor system that is easy to insert and remove and that has interchangeable blades. It is to such a surgical retractor system and method of using thereof that the inventive concepts disclosed herein are directed.